Golden Futures
by Payson-Nicky-forever
Summary: After the 2012 Olympics, Kelly Parker and Nicky Russo stayed in England. Austin Tucker and Payson Keeler took over the Rock. Now, the Russos are returning to the States. Can these two families coexist in the gymnastics world, or will things come to blows?
1. Changes

**Golden Futures  
Chapter 1  
Changes**

Kelly stood in the center of the room where her two year-old daughter had practically grown up. With Leah's little arms wrapped tightly around her neck, Kelly twirled around one then twice, trying to take in twenty-six months worth of her daughter's life in just the few short minutes she had left in the room.

She took Leah's little hand in her own, then pointed to the light pink rug that was laying in the center of the hardwood floor. "This is where you said your first words," Kelly whispered in her ear. "Daddy and I were sitting there with you, and I kept telling you to say 'momma'. After I said it twenty times, you looked right at him and said 'dadda'. He still won't let me live that down."

She pointed Leah's hand at the white rocking chair in the far corner of the room. "The first and only time I dropped you," Kelly told her with a small laugh. "I was sitting in that chair. You were sick, your first cold, and you were really fussy. You kept trying to squirm out of my arms when I tried to give you the medicine. Somehow you managed to roll right out of my arms and onto the floor. Daddy came running up the stairs when he heard the screaming. Not you, but me," Kelly laughed again. "I was so freaked out, and you were just lying there in the floor, looking at me like I was crazy."

Kelly let go of Leah's hand and touched the light pink walls with her own hand. "Daddy and I fought constantly about the color here," she recalled. "I didn't want to paint the walls pink. I thought it was too overdone. Every baby girl has a pink nursery, and I wanted yours to be different. It was going to be that pretty light green color over there," she said, pointing to the green letters above the crib that spelled out Leah's name. "But your daddy wanted pink. He said green just wasn't a good color for a nursery. So you know what we did? We let you choose. When you were three months old, just before we moved you out of our room and into yours, we held out the color splotches to you and you chose the pink."

She looked around the room again, taking it all in. Then she looked down at her daughter, fast asleep in her arms. Kelly smiled to herself as she walked over to Leah's pretty white crib with its green and pink bedding. Rather than lay her daughter down for her nap as she had every day for two years, Kelly reached up and pulled down each of the letters from the wall. Then she walked to the door. She surveyed the room one last time before turning off the light and walked out the door.

...

"Mindy!" Payson shouted at her three year-old daughter. The little girl looked up at her mother, lip stick smeared all over the lower portion of her face. Payson had to fight back the urge to laugh and run for her camera. "No, you know better," she said instead. Payson ran over and snatched the tube of lipstick from her little hands, smacking her lightly on her wrist as a form of discipline.

"I'm sorry, Mommy," Mindy said innocently.

Payson smiled and picked her daughter up off the bathroom floor. She was about to walk into the living room and place her in the time-out chair before another blond head appeared in the doorway of the bathroom. "Come on, babe," Austin Tucker told her with a smile. "She's sorry. She won't do it again. Will you Minnie?"

The girl shook her head, her blonde pig tails flopping adorably. "See? There's no need to punish her."

"Did you even open all the parenting books and magazines I bought you before she was born?" Payson asked him. "They said if you don't punish from a young age children will grow up thinking there are no consequences for their actions."

"No, I didn't read those magazines, but I do know that you punishing her for everything is why she likes me more," he said, flashing her his signature smirk.

"I don't punish her for everything," Payson argued.

"Whatever you say."

"Here," she said, handing Mindy to him. "Just take her into the living room so I can get ready."

"Get ready for what?" he asked.

"The awards banquet at the Rock."

"Oh, right. I don't have to go to that, do I?"

"Considering that we're the head coaches there, I would think so."

Austin touched his forehead and cheeks dramatically before saying, "You know, babe, I think I'm coming down with something. I'm feeling a little feverish. I had better stay home tonight, don't want to get any of the gymnasts sick."

Payson picked up Austin's perfectly tailored suit from the bathroom floor, where he had thrown it last week when she first told him about the banquet, and tossed it at him. "You're going tonight," she told him flatly.

...

"Are you ready?" Nicky asked Kelly when she exited the front door of their quaint little cottage with Leah in her arms. Kelly nodded slowly as she handed him the sleeping brunette. "Are you okay?" he asked her as he placed Leah in her car seat, careful not to wake her or her six week-old baby sister.

Kelly nodded again. "Yeah, just a little sad to be leaving."

Nicky quietly closed the back seat door of their family SUV before walking over to his wife. He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close to him. "You're the one that wanted to leave, Kel," he reminded her in a whisper.

"I know, but I still blame you," she said without a drop of anger or resentment in her voice.

Nicky chuckled. "Why?"

"We're leaving London to go coach in Denver. If we hadn't started coaching here, we wouldn't have to move."

"If we hadn't moved here to begin with, we wouldn't have to move," he countered.

"We moved here to get away from gymnastics," she said with a sigh, abandoning their pointless exchange in favor of what was really bothering her.

"_You_ moved here to get away from gymnastics. I moved here to be with you."

"And _you _met Daphne first, and agreed to coach her without even asking my opinion."

Nicky shook his head, though Kelly, her head still buried in his chest, couldn't see. "I agreed to go watch her practice, not to coach her. You're the one that agreed to coach her."

"Nick," she said, finally getting to her point, and pulling away to look him in the eyes. "I don't know if I want Leah and Aubrey to grow up around gymnastics. I want them to have everything we didn't."

"It has to be their choice to start competing, Kel. We agreed on that when Leah was born. So it should be their choice not to, too. You can't just keep them away from the sport we both love just because you're still not over what happened here over four years ago," he said, knowing he was crossing a line that he had been avoiding.

Kelly glared at him, pulling out of his arms. "It has nothing to do with what happened in 2012," she snapped at him before climbing into the passenger seat, slamming the door and waking up both of their sleeping children.

...

"It is with great pleasure that Austin and I present the Rock's annual Gymnast of the Year Award to," Payson paused for a moment to add a little drama, although every person in the room knew whose name was about to come out of her mouth. "National Champion Jasmine Porter."

Payson held out the trophy to the sixteen year-old gymnast as she climbed the stairs to the stage, her dark brown hair flowing behind her as she walked. Jasmine took the trophy and smiled to the crowd. "Thank you," she said, the audiances cue to cut the applause. "This past year as been a whirlwind for me. As if trying to defend my title isn't enough, I have press conferences, photoshoots, and all the other things that come along with being at the top of a sport. It's been pretty hectic, but I get through it because of all the support I have recieved here at the Rock. Without all of you, I could never have managed."

Jasmine stepped down from the stage as the crowd erupted in applause for her 'spur-of-the-moment-heartfelt-speech' that she had read from a teleprompter that no one besides the people on the stage could see.

"And our last award for the night," Austin said, the first words he spoke since Payson dragged him onto the stage. "Is the Payson Keeler Award." Payson turned to him, her eyes the size of saucers. She and Austin had mutually agreed to discontinue the award, thinking it inappropriate for Payson to had out an award in her own honor.

"This girl represents everything it means to be a champion. Determination, talent, and most of all, heart," he said, looking around the room and noticing that Jasmine was practically already walking to the stage. "This girl doesn't get all the recognition she deserves, but it doesn't bother her. She takes all her frustration and channels it into her gymnastics. It is with great pleasure that I present the Payson Keeler Award to Brittani Ross."

Brittani looked at him in shock, her eyes quickly turning to the shell-shocked Jasmine. She sat in her seat, completely frozen by shock and fear. "Brittani, come get the trophy," Austin sang into the microphone, attempting to lighten the mood in the room.

The red-haired girl stood from her seat, her legs shaking as her knees tried to give out on her. She took the trophy from Austin, praying that she wouldn't drop it during her speech. "I, um,-" she looked over to Payson for help, but the blond girl was as shocked as she was. "I want to thank Austin and Payson," she began. "Without them, I would just be another farm girl in Alabama right now. No Olympic dreams, no gymnastics period. They've given me the chance to make my dream come true." She turned to Austin and Payson, a smile on her face. "And I promise you guys that I won't let you down."

* * *

**Okay, I know what many of you are thinking. _'This is just going to be another version of Bitter Rivals'_. Well, you're wrong!**

**In the beginning, this is mainly going to be about Payson and Austin's gymnasts (Jasmine and Brittani) competing against Nicky and Kelly's future gymnasts. But of course, Kelly and Payson will make things personal between them, eventually dragging Leah and Mindy into it as well.**

**Fans of Bitter Rivals:  
For Nicky and Kelly's gymnasts, would me naming them Bailey and Amari be a bad idea? The characters are pretty much going to be the spitting image of them, so it would be easier for me to name them that. But if it would confuse you guys, I won't.**

**Things in this chapter you _must_ remember for the rest of the story:**

**1) Kelly being upset about 2012.  
2) Daphne (A former gymnast of Nicky and Kelly's that will shake things up a bit in future chapters)  
3) Jasmine reading from a teleprompter (Not specifically that, but her being kind of a phony)**

**I think that's pretty much it. I'm going to try for weekly updates, but as usual, I make no promises.**

**Reviews = faster updates!**


	2. Regrets

**Golden Futures  
Chapter 2  
Regrets**

"We've been here one week, Nick. One week, and that girl has me ready to pull my hair out!" Kelly complained in the car after an excruicatingly long day coaching at Denver Elite.

"She's the Junior National Champion," he reminded her.

Kelly gave him a disbelieving look. "She can be a complete pain in the ass just because she's the _Junior _National Champion, yet you constantly berated me for just taunting the competition when I was the _actual _National Champion?"

Nicky laughed. "Cut her a little slack, Kel. This girl might be our only shot for the rest of our coaching careers to coach an all-around Olympic gold medalist. I know she's a brat, but I also know that every coach in the country wants her at their gym."

"Our only shot? Have you just completely forgotten about Daphne?"

"It's only been two monthes, Kel."

_Kelly and Nicky stood beside the vault, watching as Daphne Emorson prepared to do a vault that would nearly cement her place on the podium at the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Jenero. The eighteen year-old gymnast was in the middle of one of the best medal fights in Olympic history, with only a few one hundreths of a point separating the first through sixth place girls._

_They watched as she took a deep breath and saluted the crowd and judges, the smile on her face shinning as bright as her glittery eyeshadow. Then she took off down the runway, her dark brown ponytail flapping behind her as she sprinted._

_Everything looked as perfect as always when she went into her roundoff back handspring. She hit the springboard just hard enough to get enough height to go into her Double twisting Yurchenko._

_Then everything went to hell. __She over-twisted her body, and when it came time to land, Daphne somehow, someway, managed to get her feet directly underneathe her. Unfortunatly, she landed much too hard, her feet sliding directly out from underneath her._

_While the sold-out stadium gasped, Nicky and Kelly rushed toward Daphne, her and Nicky having been the only ones standing close enough to hear her ankle bone snap._

_..._

_Kelly walked briskly down the hallway toward room 407, clutching her old Team USA gymnastics jacket to her chest. After a half hour of arguing with the guy at the front desk, their language barrier making it hard for him to tell her that the entire 4th floor was closed to vistors and for her to tell him to fuck off, Kelly had managed to harrass her way onto the floor where her gymnast was._

_"Hey, you," she whispered after knocking on the open door._

_Daphne turned toward her, tear stained cheeks and puffy eyes making Kelly's heart break. "Hey," she mumbled, her voice barely audible over the sound of a Spanish soap opera playing on the television._

_"Look," she said, not bothering with small talk. "What happened to you never should have happened. I feel like it's all my fault. I'm your coach. I should have helped you prepare better or something." Her voice actually cracked on a couple of words, but Kelly managed to keep control of her emotions._

_Daphne smiled slightly. "You did everything you could. I did everything I could. Sometimes things just go wrong."_

_"Yeah, and sometimes they go really wrong."_

_"Kelly, I'm the one that should apologize. I let you down. I let Nicky down. I let my parents down. My sister and brother. The entire bloody country. I should have brought home the all-around gold medal to England."_

_"You didn't let anyone down. You did your best, Daphne"_

_"And my best just wasn't good enough."_

_"There's always next time."_

_Daphne raised her eyebrows. "Do you honestly think I'm going to come back to gymnastics after what happened?"_

_"Yes. I figured you would want to redeem yourself."_

_"Well, I don't. After what happened at the Olympics, I want to get as far away from this stupid sport as I can."_

_"Something we have in common. Or had. But, Daph, I didn't come here to talk about this. I came here to give you something."_

_Kelly walked toward the bed and handed Daphne her jacket. "Your National Team jacket? Why are you giving me this?"_

_"I'm not giving you the jacket. I'm giving you what's in the left pocket."_

_Daphne looked at her quizically before laying the jacket out in the bed and reaching into the left pocket. She gasped when she pulled out a shiny gold circle with a string attached to it._

_"One of your gold medals!" she exclaimed._

_"My all-around gold medal from 2012," Kelly explained._

_"I can't keep this, Kelly."_

_"You should have one of your own, and maybe if I had been a better coach, you would. So mine is yours."_

...

"You know," Austin said to Payson while they stood in the kitchen of their Boulder apartment. Payson was at the counter cutting up tomatos for a salad, and Austin was sitting on one of the three barstools, being completely useless. "I think your mom wants to take Mindy from us."

Payson laughed. "I don't think my mother spends her free time conspiring to kidnap our three year-old, Austin."

"Well of course not! Kidnapping her would be too obvious. Your mom is _way_ too smart for that. She's secretly turning Minnie against us while she babysits her. Eventually, Mindy's going to want to move in with your mom and dad."

"That's ridiculous."

"Is it? She didn't want to come home with us today, did she?"

"Becca is coming to visit today, and you know how much Mindy loves her 'Auntie Beccy'."

Austin nodded. "Becca's part of it too! She doesn't have any kids of her own, so she's going to help your mom and dad steal ours!"

Payson looked up from the cutting board and turned to Austin. "Becca's nineteen. She's in college. She has her whole life ahead of her. Why would she want a toddler right now?"

"I thought Becca was, like, way older than you," Austin said, confused.

Payson laughed. "Maybe if you would come to our Keeler family reunions, Thanksgiving dinner, Christmas dinners, or even just Sunday dinners you would know more about my family."

"What more do I need to know? Your family likes to eat a lot."

"Austin-"

"Besides, they don't like me anyway."

"Yes they do."

"Your dad came after me with a shotgun, Payson."

"Only after he found out I was pregnant."

"Well I don't think death is the correct punishment for knocking you up."

"My dad did."

"Which is why I don't go to Keeler family get togethers! How do I know he or your mom won't slip a little something-something in my drink? I can see the headlines now: 'Former Olympic Gold Medalist Killed by Baby Mama's Family'.

"You're being ridiculous," Payson said with a laugh.

"Am I?"

...

When Nicky and Kelly pulled into the parking lot at Denver Elite the next morning, they were surprised to see the girl that had quickly become the bain of thier exsistance sitting beside the locked front door, her blond hair tied back in a ponytail and her gym bag sitting beside her.

"Bailey?" Kelly asked when she climbed out of the car.

The girl looked up at them, her eyes puffy and red. "Hey," she said casually, as if it was normal for a fifteen year-old girl to be sitting outside in the cold Colorado air at five thirty in the morning.

"What are you doing here?" Nicky asked her as he closed the driver side door.

"I'm here to train," she said.

"Bailey," Kelly said. "What's going on?"

"Nothing."

Before Kelly could press the issue, Nicky shook his head at her, his way of telling her to drop it. Kelly rolled her eyes, but she didn't question the gymnast any further.

While Nicky was unlocking the door, Bailey stood up. Her body was that of a stereotypical gymnast, short and muscular. She was 4'9'' and probably had body fat percentage below five. Before moving to Denver to train full-time, she had been a pagent queen, winning nearly every beauty pagent she entered. Her talent, of course, had been gymnastics, and that was how the former Denver Elite coach discovered her.

After half an hour, another of their gymnasts arrived. Amari Frazier was slightly taller than Bailey, maybe 5'0'' or 5'1'', but she was incredibly slim. If Bailey was the perfect imbodyment of power, Amari was her opposite. Grace and art were Amari's strengths. When she competed, the crowd would watch in awe of her perfect steps and extensions. Then when she was at post-competition pressconferences, their awe of her gymnastics would be forgotten in favor of her beauty. With dark mocha skin, raven black hair, and fine, gentle facial features, Amari should have been the gymnastics media-darling. Unfortunatly for her, she competited at the same time as Bailey Ellington.

While neither girl could be called anything but beautiful, Bailey got all the media attention. It really had nothing to do with gymnastics. If it did, the National silver medalist should have been more popular than the Junior National Champion. Bailey was simply more approachable than her Denver Elite teammate.

The former Junior Miss Florida winner had a cute round face, shoulder length blond hair, and bright, piercing blue eyes, and the media and the fans loved her. She wasn't anywhere near as shy and reserved as Amari, and she wasn't as standoffish as Jasmine Porter. She was really a reporters dream. And, as Nicky and Kelly would atest, a coach's nightmare.

Stubborn, cocky, and full of herself, Bailey Ellington was too much like Kelly Parker for her own good. That was probably the reason the two were at odds everyday over everything. From exercise music to actual gymnast issues, Bailey and Kelly never agreed on anything. After only a week, Nicky had realized that coaching the incredibly talented gymnast was going to fall on him.

* * *

**I know Austin and Payson weren't really in this chapter much, but the next one will focus more on them and the Rock. They were mainly just there for a little comic relief in this one, but I did introduce some new information about them. I'm sure everyone assumed they were married like Nicky and Kelly, but they aren't. I'll explain more about their relationship in future chapters.**

**I've been thinking about how to do this story, and I think I've figured it out. 'Golden Futures' is going to focus on Nickelly and Paystin coaching their respective gymnasts to the Olympics and raising their kids. Then I'm going to write a sequel about Leah, Aubrey, and Mindy's gymnastic careers if this story keeps being so popular.**

**I hadn't planned on updating this week, but all the reviews I got for the last chapter inspired me! Knowing that others like my stories is such a good feeling. So if I get 8 or more reviews for this one, the next chapter will be out either Friday or next Saturday.**


	3. Daddy's Little Girl

**Golden Futures  
Chapter 3  
Daddy's Little Girl**

Domestic had never been a word used to describe Austin Tucker. He used to date all the hottest celebrities and party with his friends every night. Now free time was filled with tea parties and Barbie dolls. And he wouldn't want it any other way.

Miranda Grace Keeler-Tucker had him wrapped around her tiny fingers from the day she was born. The second the nurse placed her in his arms, something just clicked inside him. It was like nothing else mattered in the entire world besides the little human that was lying in his arms.

And that's why, as Mindy was throwing a tantrum in the middle of Toys R Us, he folded and placed the pink, three-story Barbie Dreamhouse in the shopping cart, even though he and Payson had decided to get it for her for Christmas.

"Thank you, Daddy," his little blond-haired, blue-eyed darling said with a brillant smile that made his heart melt.

Austin smiled back at her. "Anything for you, Minnie."

"Anything?"

Austin nodded. "What about new dolls to live in my new house?" she asked, doing her best puppy dog pout.

Austin started walking down the aisle toward the dolls, but then he stopped and turned to his daughter. "What's wrong with the dolls you already have?" he asked her.

"_Daddy_," she said, rolling her eyes just like Payson. "They all live in my three other Barbie houses." Then she ran off and started picking up dolls left and right. "These," she held them up for him to see, "will be their new neighbors."

"Maybe you should ask Santa for those dolls for Christmas," he suggested weakly.

"But Daddy," Mindy said in a pitiful voice, her eyes starting to well with tears. "Santa doesn't come for a long, long time. And I need my dolls now."

"Okay, okay," Austin said quickly before his daughter started to cry. "We'll get them today on one condition." Mindy looked at him questioningly. "You have to tell Mommy that Grandma bought them."

Mindy shook her head. "A good girl doesn't lie."

"Right," Austin said dejected. "How about not correcting me when I tell her that?"

"Okay," Mindy skipped down the aisle with the dolls in her hands, her previous tears all but forgotten. She tossed the dolls into the cart then turned to Austin. "What about new dress up clothes?"

Austin nodded, then sighed. "Pay is going to kill me."

xx

"Shh, Brey," Kelly whispered softly as she rocked her crying three month-old daughter in the nursery of their new house. Aubrey had been crying for what felt like eternity, which was nothing unusal. The baby never slept for more than two hours at a time. Aubrey had deffinetly made Nicky and Kelly appreciate what a good baby Leah was, sleeping through the night and hardly ever crying.

"Is she still crying?" Nicky asked her from the doorway, his hair even messier than usual from the four hours of sleep he managed to get that night.

Kelly looked up at him and snapped, "Obviously."

Nicky ignored her and walked over to the rocking chair. "Why don't you go get some sleep," he said softly as he lifted the crying little girl from her arms.

Kelly yawned and stretched as she stood up. "What time is it?" she asked groggily.

"Three in the morning," he replied once he replaced her in the chair.

She yawned again. "We can't keep this up, Nick. Going to the gym at six after being up with Aubrey all night. It's killing both of us."

"What choices do we have? Quit coaching? Give her back to the stork?"

"Hire a nanny?"

Nicky shook his head. "No way. Uh uh. We've always said we would never hire some stranger to raise our kids, Parks."

"It would just be at night. I don't want a nanny either, but we have to work and someone has to be up with her all night."

"Let's talk about it in the morning. Go get some sleep.

"Goodnight."

" 'night."

xx

"Austin," Payson snarled when he walked into their apartment carrying a sleeping Mindy in one arm and dragging five Toys R Us bags with the other.

Austin dropped the bags on the floor and kissed her cheek as he walked passed to lay Mindy down on the couch. "Hey babe," he said unsurely.

"You better not have bought her what I think you did," she said.

"Your mom called when Mindy and I were driving back from the park. She said she had bought her some toys and asked me to stop and pick them up on the way home."

Payson shot him a look.

"It's true."

"No, it's not. My mom and dad are in Denver visiting Becca at college."

"Oh," he sighed and sat down on the couch. "Let the nagging begin," he mumbled under his breath.

Payson started pacing across the floor in front of him. "She's never going to learn what it's like to have an authority figure tell her she can't do something or she can't have something."

"Yeah, she is. That's your job."

"You think I like having to be the bad guy all the time?"

"You sure seem to."

Payson stopped and looked at him. "Do you want our daughter to turn into one of those spoiled, prima donna, princesses like Lauren, and Kaylie?"

"No, Pay, but-"

"Then learn to use the word _no_. Two letters, Austin, N-O. Say it with me, _no_."

"Okay, okay. But you're going to let her have the toys, right?

"No. See? It's easy."

* * *

**I'm alive!**

**I could give countless excuses, but I'll just get on with the A/N.**

**My writing skills are a little rusty, so please excuse that. I'm still trying to get back into writing. And I'm sorry this chapter is so short, but it's better than nothing. Please review!**


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